Speed looks like lots of fun. Not exactly my cup of tea, however. No, I'm sugesting a 140 MPH combat plane with flight characteristics like today's FC or FAI planes. 1 foot loops,
blinding acceleration, a visual blur as it goes by or in a tight turn, a doppler effect that would warp your mind. Can you dig it? Let's have some fun here. I know it's never been done, but the best minds in CL post here. Help me design a combat plane within these perameters. Please?

Perhaps most would vote the Yuvenko a great place to begin an upscale process. A Super Voodoo might be lighter and a Bosta would be prettiest. But there are some things I don't understand about aerodynamics. Does anyone build with carbon fiber? Use an arrow shaft for single boomer Bosta light reinforced with carbon fiber,,can you see it?

In Rat Racing, we discovered fairly early on that Fast Rats above 140 mph couldn't be flown 3-up. I think that the Big Block crowd reacted to the large power jump between a Mark VI and a Nelson with bigger planes, not faster ones, because 120 mph times two, for 240 mph closing speeds, was the max that normal human reflexes could handle.

We could fly as fast as 120 with small planes in the late 1960s, early 1970s, and did the same thing when Fox's Mark IIIs and IVs came along in the 70's, increased the sizes of the planes. I flew a "Fast Phantom" on a Mark IV in the late 1980s at 121 mph, and it was screwing me down into the ground any time I leveled it out.

I wasn't interested in flying that one two-up. Anyway, match the planes Jeff sells to a Pylon Racing engine (40s), and those will fly the way you want, I'll bet (read about the Sonic Chicken Fast at Thompson's NW area newletter's web site).

Kiwi: I'm not thinking two up. This would be a sport flyer-just for fun. Lotsa very, very fast fun. A 40 pylon race engine on FC plane for 140 MPH? OK, I was thinking bigger and longer lines, but I'm sure you're right. On 60 foot lines that'd be fast!
Any ideas for combat design that'd do 140 MPH on 80 foot lines? Perhaps a pylon race engine on a FC plane on 80 foot lines?

Kiwi: I'm not thinking two up. This would be a sport flyer-just for fun. Lotsa very, very fast fun. A 40 pylon race engine on FC plane for 140 MPH? OK, I was thinking bigger and longer lines, but I'm sure you're right. On 60 foot lines that'd be fast!
Any ideas for combat design that'd do 140 MPH on 80 foot lines? Perhaps a pylon race engine on a FC plane on 80 foot lines?

Line length only changes the "apparent" speed, so 140 mph on 60' will hardly change at 80', although the added stretch will force the use of solid lines. I would try 70' before 80', however. There are reasons why we don't see any 80' ready-made lines; I just am having another Senior Moment and it isn't coming to me.

80 feet lines are 25% longer than 60 footers. Reducing the percieved speed to the flyer by 25%. Therefore, to the flyer, 140 MPH of 80 foot lines would look more like 105 MPH on 60 foot lines. That plane would scream, accelerate, turn and blur the vision with an incredible doppler shift like no one's ever seen or heard on a CL combat plane before. The Bosta, with its eliptical wing restricts the size of the golf tube. A Nemesis would allow a fuel cell/golf tube all the way to the wing tip, if desired. ( A pylon race 40 would drink lots of fuel) And I don't see a way to put a long golf tube in a Super Voodoo. Yuvenko, anyone?

OK, found the Sonic Chicken. Nice. I think I'd build one from balsa for aesthetics at least. Rear intake on a pylon engine means much longer, probably bigger engine bearers. Kicking the enging so far farward would probably require a longer boom to get the correct balance.

OK, found the Sonic Chicken. Nice. I think I'd build one from balsa for aesthetics at least. Rear intake on a pylon engine means much longer, probably bigger engine bearers. Kicking the enging so far farward would probably require a longer boom to get the correct balance.

Dubby's 40 is the best of all of them, IMO, and is front rotary. I have a pic of a CL version:

I must've done something odd. It didn't show up until I posted the message.

I didn't pay attention to the cost, but I think they will be in the same $275 ballpark as a PA 40 from Randy Smith would be (money is no object?)

It does appear that his best 40s / 46s are rear exhaust now. But I will bet Jeff could route that away from anything critical if you ordered a (Big) Sonic Chicken for an RE setup, His eMail (Carol's, really, he's only within the past few weeks made his first steps into PC using, and is still reluctant about it):